Residents and staff already miss 31/2-year Rockford, who has been a daily fixture at the center until he ran away from his weekend home sometime Saturday.

Rockford went home for the weekend and escaped, along with a black Labrador retriever. The other dog was found but Rockford is still missing.

``He's such a wonderful dog. It could be somebody found him and has kind of adopted him,'' said Nancy Gavaghan, recreational therapy director at the center. Rockford obeys 30 commands and spent two years in Kansas training for his ``job'' at the center.

There is a $300 reward for his return - not to mention the thanks of all the seniors whose lives Rockford is a part of every day. Normally, the bandanna-wearing pooch is on duty at the center Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

At the center, Rockford would visit each room twice a day. Residents would groom him, pet him and even bake him doggie cookies.

``He was part of our family,'' Gavaghan said. ``He stayed around the facility and made himself at home. He had the run of the whole facility. He loves being around people. There are about 170 very lonesome residents right now.''

Gavaghan said Rockford has numbers tattooed on his lower body that can help identify him. The numbers were placed there after he graduated from the Kansas Special Dog Service. The nonprofit organization trains between 40 and 50 dogs a year.

George is not snappy, nasty or yappy, qualities I'd noted in other members of the breed.

We didn't get him because of those trendy Taco Bell commercials. This was strictly a humanitarian move. A friend of my wife's found him and trained him but couldn't keep him because of incompatibilities with other pets. We came to the rescue.

The ancient Aztecs considered Chihuahuas holy. They were buried with their owners. It was believed the dogs would carry the owners' sins, absolving them from wrongdoings, and guard their masters in the afterlife.